Efforts for Queen pick up steam

The Delta Queen riverboat, a Stockton grand dame cooling her heels in Chattanooga, Tenn., may come out of semi-retirement and run the Mississippi River again.

Michael Fitzgerald

The Delta Queen riverboat, a Stockton grand dame cooling her heels in Chattanooga, Tenn., may come out of semi-retirement and run the Mississippi River again.

I like to keep up with the Queen. She's the masterpiece of Stockton's boatbuilding era and an American treasure, the last traditional steamboat plying America's rivers.

Or she was until 2008. Caught in the crossfire of a political dispute, the Queen lost her waiver from federal fire safety regulations. She had to tie up.

The Queen is tied up in Chattanooga's downtown, on the north shore of the Tennessee River, at a place called Coolidge Park Landing. She is a hotel.

Now the Queen's owner, Ambassadors International, has hired a new broker to accelerate the paddlewheeler's sale. At least two prospective buyers envision giving the Queen back her old job.

"The Delta Queen isn't a hotel. She's a boat," said Vicki Webster, spokesperson for the Save the Delta Queen 2010 of Cincinnati. "Boats are meant to travel."

Webster strongly believes the Queen should be carrying passengers around the Mississippi River system, as she did from 1948 to 2008. Tying her up is sacrilege.

"I have not been down to Chattanooga on purpose," Webster said. "I do not want to see her tied up like that. It would be like looking at my mother's corpse."

The Delta Queen - along with her co-sovereign, The Delta King - was half-built in Scotland from 1924 to '26, shipped in pieces to Stockton, finished and launched in 1927.

She was the ritziest, most expensive sternwheel passenger boat ever.

Accoutrements for 176 passengers included grand staircases, chandeliers, stained glass, tapestries, and a grand piano that buoyed so much merriment on the saloon deck during overnight voyages between Sacramento and San Francisco, sleep-deprived passengers, the story goes, once pushed it overboard.

The auto put her out of business in 1941. After wartime service, she was towed through the Panama Canal and put to work on the Mississippi and its tributaries.

Save the Delta Queen 2010's consortium of buyers is led by Robert Rintz, former Louisiana State Tourism Director and former executive with the Delta Queen Steamboat Company.

"We intend to make her live again so that future generations have the chance to travel on this quintessentially American treasure," Rintz said in a statement.

"And," Rintz said, "so that river towns in 17 states can benefit from the revenue she brings to their communities."

That - the Queen's role in economic recovery - is her supporters' new argument for reversing the 2007 decision that put her out of the passenger business.

The Queen had been getting periodic congressional waivers from fire safety regulations. But in 2007, Rep. James Oberstar, chairman of the House Transportation Committee, denied further waivers.

Whatever the case, the political environment has changed. In the recent election, Oberstar was booted from office. A Republican will now chair the Transportation Committee.

That suits the Queen's supporters fine. They are confident Republicans will renew the waiver.

Save the Delta Queen 2010 submits its bid today.

But the Queen has royal suitors in the form of rival bidders.

One group wants to transport the Queen to Orlando, gut her and divide her into timeshares.

Chattanooga wants to keep her. City and county officials recently held a Rally on the River Day to proclaim the boat "part of our community" and support efforts of the hotel's leasees and operators, Leah Ann and Randy Ingram, to buy her.

The Ingrams say their ultimate goal, too, is to return the Queen to river travel.

"But understand that is a monumental task," Leah Ann Ingram said in a news release. "Having her open to the public as a revenue generating hotel while ... repairs are made is critical to any successful plan to put the boat back in service."

If Save the Delta 2010 is the winning bidder, the Queen, after needed repairs, could be back on the river within a year, Webster said.

"Congress was throwing taxpayers' money hand over fist at the economy, trying to improve conditions, and we all know what happened there," Webster said. "The ironic thing is if they had only allowed the Delta Queen to stay in operation she would have continued to benefit the economy of river communities in 17 states without costing the taxpayers a dime."